t 405 ESTABLISHED 1875. Sg^6ET0VI»H2^i St OLD ROME AND NEW ITALY. OLD ROME AND NEW ITALY. (RECUERDOS DE ITALIA.) By EMILIO CASTELmC- w AUTHOR OF "THE REPUBLICAN MOVEMENT IN EUROPE," NOW PUBLISHING IN " HARPER'S MAGAZINE." TRANSLATED BY MRS. ARTHUR ARNOLD. r NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE. 1875- D& 437 B, 0. PUBLIC LIB»A»f SflPT. lO, 1940 9 O CONTENTS. PAGE ARRIVAL IN ROME 9 THE GREAT RUIN 31 THE ROMAN CATACOMBS 52 THE SISTINE CHAPEL 70 THE CAMPO SANTO OF PISA 107 VENICE . .* . . 132 ON THE LAGUNES* 154 THE GOD OF THE VATICAN 170 THE GHETTO 246 THE GREAT CITY 265 PARTHENOPE 284 PREFACE. TO THE READER. This book is the record of the lively emotions awakened in my soul by the marvelous spectacles of Italy. It is not a book of travels. I have not designed to add one more to the excellent works we already possess in Castilian upon the artistic nation, for these are in the hands of all travelers. When a people, a monument, or a landscape made a profound impression on my mind, I took my pen and hastened to communicate that feeling to my readers with all fidelity. I have not, then, followed any order or itinerary in my book. I have placed my pictures where it seemed best, so that they do not bear any particular relation to each other ; and I have sometimes returned to a town from which I seemed to have departed. Each picture may therefore form a sepa- rate work. In these pages there is but little of the present life and manners of Italy. With that nation, the longer it lives the more it recollects. We must look at it historically and aes- thetically. We must endeavor to connect its great monu- ments with the ages in which they were constructed, with the generations to which they owe their creation. In Italy, we v ili PREFACE. must before every landscape or every ruin evoke the august shades which realize them, and gather the living ideas dis- tilled from her fruitful bosom. Otherwise it is useless to travel there. In her history there is an order which is not a natural or- der, but a human order, like the transition from the ancient world to the modern world — like the passing from the Middle Age to the Renaissance. By those buildings so famed for beauty, those statues so serene and lovely, have passed all the tempests of the human spirit. Knowledge has opened their wounds } and on seeing them, one feels in heart and brain the immense effort it has cost ages to create the modern spirit in which we breathe and live. For this reason a journey to Italy is a journey through all periods of history. And this is why an essay upon Italy, rather than a description, should be, in my judgment, a revival. I have intended to keep al- ways in mind that above these great works of art, of archaeol- ogy, history is visible. I am happy, quite happy, if I have succeeded in imparting to my readers the thoughts that, so to speak, are exhaled from the artistic works and the historical recollections of immortal Italy. Emilio Castelar. Madrid. OLD ROME AND NEW ITALY. Chapter I. ARRIVAL IN ROME. At last 'we were at Civita Vecchia. As the boat rapidly neared the shore, our hearts bounded in our bosoms with en- thusiasm. The buildings and all around spoke of antiquity. However little inclined to classical studies, one is tempted at such a moment to repeat the verses which Virgil puts into the mouths of the companions of ^Eneas. The emotions awak- ened by the first sight of Italy are enduring — not transient as the furrow of a vessel in the ocean. I sprung joyfully to land, and if our prosaic age did not quarrel with outward manifestation of high sentiments, I would have flung myself on my knees and kissed the earth. Italiam^ Italiam, primus condamat Achates. But in my excitement I forgot I was in Pontifical Italy. A custom-house officer stopped us, demand- ing the price of admission as at a theatre. A crowd of beg- gars, whose statuesque features bore the sad stamp of misery, with loud clamors divided our luggage among them as a rich booty. Then the police claimed our passports, now abolished in all civilized Europe ; exacting another govern- A ? ARRIVAL IN ROME. merit duty, although they had been previously vised and taxed by the Nuncio in Paris and at the Consulate in Marseilles. Following our baggage, we entered a wretched store-house, dark as a dungeon of the Inquisition ; an obscurity incom- prehensible in this land of resplendent heavens and dazzling light, which gives to the eyes a feast of colors, and fills the mind with poetic rapture. For articles worn, or intended to be worn, custom-house dues were exacted. When these were paid, and we fancied we were free to move, all our effects were placed in a cart drawn by a number of ragged and shirtless lads, who cried, " To the custom-house !" A second time ? These taxes and tariffs, this want of intercourse with the world — are these also of divine right ? Is it essential to the exercise of the Pope's authority over consciences that he should incline to the economic errors of prohibition and the political errors of absolutism ? I compared this entrance into the Pontifical States with my arrival in the Swiss Cantons. Certainly, sentiments not less sublime are awakened at beholding those mountains crowned with eternal snows ; those dark and shady groves beside which stretch meadows of tender green enameled with flowers \ those azure lakes sleeping at the foot of gentle slopes, contrasting with hoary peaks half-veiled by clouds ; those impetuous torrents of crystal waters ; those villages peopled by a vigorous and hardy race, which realizes the greatest happiness known to human society — the union of liberty and democracy. Nothing disturbs the traveler in the contemplation of this grandeur. No policeman demands his ARRIVAL IN ROME. name, no custom-house official searches his baggage. These mountains seem like impenetrable barriers, but liberty has thrown them open to the world, while on the Roman shore — those coasts which look so gentle and tranquil — absolutism has placed a cloud of spies and tax-gatherers, to inclose the country which nature has opened to all nations and to every breath of Heaven. Nothing is more inconvenient than the registration of lug- gage; nothing more tormenting and ridiculous. On books, especially, custom-house officers fall with inquisitorial eager- ness. And after having tossed about and examined every thing, they send the traveler's effects to the station, demand- ing another tax, which last forced contribution is equal to the first. Who can patiently endure such an administration? Is it possible that there exists in central Europe a beautiful and classic country, more remarkable for its glorious past than any other, under such injudicious and ruinous guardian- ship? Will not the Holy Spirit, which pours forth torrents of religious truth on the Church of St. Peter — will it not in mercy shed a few drops of political truth and economy, at once the happiness and riches of modern peoples ? The soul shrinks from all that is administrative, to turn to the lovely and picturesque in this land of song and flowers. The heavens and the sea are of brilliant azure, the air mild and aromatic ; the rocks which bind the coast are gilded and em- browned by the sun ; on the trees the tender leaves come forth to meet the soft kisses of April ; and among groups of merry and half-clothed children every now and then mingle I2 ARRIVAL IN ROME. the white tunics and gray serge robes of friars, looking like the living ruins of other ages, and moving like the ignis fatu- us over the crumbling monuments of antiquity. The hour of departure strikes. The whistle sounds. Ci- vita Vecchia is the port of the Roman States ; but there are no carts, nor barrels, nor burdens, nor laborers — nothing in- dicative of commercial existence except the custom-house officials placed there to obstruct it. I had often heard of the dreariness of the Roman Campagna, but I had not imagined its reality. Death seems to have swallowed even the ruins. Ravens and vultures have eaten even the bones of this huge corpse. There are eleven stations between the sea and the Eternal City, but no town near any of them. The officials call out the names, such as Rio Fiume or Magliana ; sounds lost in distant echoes in the immensity of the desert. It is very strange to see a train in solitude, no one mounting or descending, no one looking on, no one loading or unloading. A circular hovel, surmounted by a wooden cross, is dignified by the name of "the station." They look like the tombs of savages. The train moves as slowly as a cart, so there is ample time to observe the immense horizon, the desolate plain, the vast marshes, some frightened horses and buffa- loes, a few shepherds on worn-out ponies, or a cart with a poor fever-stricken family — the remains of a nomade race, dying in the desert where so many majestic remains of antiq- uity have fallen and are buried. Economic errors are to be found in all ages and even amid much civilization. When Cincinnatus cultivated the Roman ARRIVAL IN ROME, I3 plains in the early days of the Republic, they might have been called the earthly Elysian Fields ; a plantation of riches, an abode of happiness and abundance. Wine, corn, oil, milk, and honey were produced in such quantities by agricultural labor that Rome was sufficient for herself. But by degrees the great families took possession of the ground once owned and tilled by many. In order to avoid daily labor they con- verted agricultural land into pasturage. One slave was enough to guard the flock. Irrigation was suspended ; the canals dried up, drainage was stopped. Water became stag- nant in low places ; those streams which had brought life in their flow, scattered death by their putrid emanations. Hav- ing conquered the known world, the Roman people were no longer employed with war and had forgotten the occupations of peace. The want of food and pleasure opened the way for despotism. From despotism came the moral death which is in tyranny, as material death is in the Pontine marshes. Well did Pliny say — Latifundia Italiam perdidere. At last, at the fall of evening, when shadows hung over Rome, we arrived in the Eternal City ; that city which gave us jurisprudence with her praetors, liberty with her tribunes, authority with her Caesars, religion with her priests : that city on which the annals of the human race are written ; the tomb of antiquity; the triumphal arch through which the modern ages have been ushered ; the temple to which generations of Catholics have come for fifteen centuries, seeking spiritual light ; the great school in which artists learn before thousands of statues and columns the secrets of the chisel \ the battle- 14 ARRIVAL IN ROME. field on which lie buried the gods of ancient theologies, brought to the Pantheon on cars of triumph ; the city the most august and most powerful that has ever existed on the earth ; that which still directs the conscience of a part of the human family by the prestige of its history, by the mysteries which arise from its majestic ruins. I am penetrated with a deep sentiment of veneration toward this city, unique in the world. Babylon, Tyre, Jerusalem, Athens, Alexandria, have reigned in ancient story at different intervals and at certain periods, realizing each one its idea \ then it has disappeared in the dust of its ruins, without other trace than the records of its existence, or the bones of its children in the earth. Paris, London, and New York will be great in history ; but this Rome, which the ancients justly called Eternal, belongs to both hemispheres of times — the heathen and the Christian world. With what emotions Rome inspires the traveler ! He may be strictly Catholic ; the impressions of his early education may remain unsullied, but at beholding these statues of an- tiquity, these fauns with their immortal smile, these goddesses in whose marble flesh appears to circulate the warmth of life and the blood of unfading youth ; before that choir of Greek divinities in their dignified repose and Olympic serenity ; in the wondrous harmony of outline and the splendid beauty of expression \ the vitality which hangs on those lips almost vi- brating with the hymn of classic poesy ; — before those forms of stone, more animated and intelligent than their living guard- ians, he is overcome with sorrow for the death of art, and led ARRIVAL IN ROME. I5 to wish the temples of antiquity could rise from their ruins and continue their songs and sacrifices, the eloquent pages of Plato or the glowing words of Demosthenes, in the midst of that world of deities which pour upon the earth from cups of amber the nectar of eternal joy. Goethe experienced this profound classical enthusiasm in the Museum of the Vatican : the abode of Catholic Pontiffs, by a miracle of art, has been converted into the Olympus of the heathen divinities ! Thus it happens in the Christian world. The great Basili- cas, notwithstanding their colossal majesty, chill the warmth of our devotion. Those monuments of bronze and marble, sparkling with gold and jewels, bathed in light, and rich in mosaics and bass-reliefs, dazzle, but do not affect us. The coldness of marble touches the soul. But on entering, for ex- ample, the Catacombs of St. Clement \ on seeing the damp earth which preserved for four centuries the seed of Christian- ity - on beholding by torchlight, in these subterraneous in- scriptions traced by the hands of martyrs, the symbols of hope in the midst of the terrors of persecution, we hear in imagina- tion the hymns of catechumens beneath the feasts of the Caesars, ascending to the circus where ferocious beasts await their prey — and the sentiment of loving admiration inspired by all great sacrifices overcomes us by its sublime mystery, leading us to contemplate on our knees the secrets of eternity, and to desire the sleep of death in the sepulchre illuminated by the faith of the first Christians. How these emotions are stifled at sight of the Pontifical Court ! I can not resist the 16 ARRIVAL IN ROME. temptation of repeating an anecdote from the most accom- plished of Italian writers, Boccaccio : a An old Florentine Christian took much pains to win souls to heaven, in order to secure his own eternal happiness ; at length he met with one, either Jew or Mohammedan — I forget which — and endeavoring to open the eyes of his soul to di- vine light, succeeded so well that in a few days he was half converted. The idea of going to Rome then occurred to the infidel ; a notion which much disconcerted the missionary, for he feared the licentiousness of that court would reduce his great work to ashes. What was his astonishment when the catechumen returned with feelings of gall toward his ancient faith and of honey toward the new, exclaiming, 'My father! I am quite converted ; for if, notwithstanding the profligacy of the clergy, the Church exists, grows, and prospers, it is doubt- less because, being the depositary of truth, it deserves the di- rect protection of Heaven !' " I will not accuse the court which surrounds Pius IX. of licentiousness. I am not accustomed to speak without proof, and am always inclined to believe more good than evil of human nature. I believe Pius IX. to be venerable from his age and perfect morality. I suppose that the example of his unsullied character influences his whole court. But I say that neither he nor his followers comprehend the free, reason- ing, and independent spirit of this age — perhaps too positive — which demands a pure and disinterested worship, in op- position to materialism ; and which can never have that de- sire satisfied by the vain and pompous luxury with which the ARRIVAL IN ROME. I? Roman Court adorns religious ceremonies, changing them into the worship of sense. To which side do the errors of this generation incline ? To that of industry and commerce. The marvels of modern progress have made us forget the sentiments hidden in the depths of the soul ! The exclusively luxurious tendency of its character may produce one of those idealistic reactions which mark the progress of the human race, as the sensuality of the Roman Empire operating on the conscience brought the too spiritual reaction of Christianity, and converted a world of epicureans into a world of monks. The ancient religion of the spirit may well experience a conscientious crisis in order to recover some part of the moral influence it has lost. But with this system of unrestrained luxury ; of strangely dressed courtiers and pages clad in gold ; of cardinals attired in purple and ermine ; of bishops with Oriental mitres ; of Swiss, who re- semble harlequins ; of noble body-guards, who throw black velvet mantles on their shoulders and wear silver swords by their sides ; of servants clothed in all the hues of the rain- bow ; of lackeys, whose finery challenges the painted parrots of the tropics ; of soldiers with uniforms like that of General Boom in the Grand Duchess of Gerolstein — with all this East- ern ostentation the Papal Court wanders from Christ and ap- proaches Heliogabalus. It is Palm Sunday. The great Basilica of St. Peter is going to bestow the benediction of Palms. Behind in the church the people are crushed together, as if they had not received with baptism the seal of Christian equality. From the grand jg ARRIVAL IN ROME. altar to the great door are two lines of soldiers to prevent the multitude from pressing on the Pope. Although the assem- blage is most numerous, it does not fill the immense space ; for St. Peter's could contain sixty thousand souls. The words of military command resound loudly in the temple, where the voice of prayer should alone be audible. The butts of the fire-arms fall noisily on the marble pavement. Those present are strangers. The Roman citizen has almost disappeared in the inundation of foreigners called by the Pope to his succor. At the time fixed, the procession bringing Pius IX. appears. It is impossible for any one to give an idea of the different dresses worn by his retinue. To do so would necessitate a masquerading nomenclature like that of Bizancio. At length, after an army of courtiers, comes the Pope, seated on a gilded throne, and borne like the saints in our processions, wearing a robe of crimson velvet and a white mitre, his left hand hold- ing the golden crosier, his right uplifted in benediction to those who implore it kneeling. St. Peter's appears a theatre. The stalls, raised on steps under the vast arches which sup- port the wondrous dome of Michael Angelo, are occupied by ladies. The arrangement of these religious seats seems the same as that of the central area of the Grand Opera of Paris. Gentlemen whose costume is strictly en regie occupy the places below 7 the stalls. During the Mass, some talk, others walk about, and all oc- casionally use opera-glasses, sometimes turned on the ladies in the stalls, sometimes directed toward the cardinals. The noble guards — dressed like our cavaliers of the Court of Philip ARRIVAL IN ROME. Ig IV., with trunk hose and silk stockings, short velvet jackets, the sleeves slashed and adorned with ellipses of satin; the mantle on the shoulder ; the dagger with hilt of steel before ; the black head-gear under the arm, and the white collar on the neck — join in the general conversation and mingle in the general promenade. The Swiss only are immovable. It is pitiful to reflect that they have been so weak-minded as to forsake the liberty of their native mountains to serve — poor mercenaries! — a foreign sovereign. Their costume was de- signed by Raphael, and in this the great painter did not prove himself a master of color — it is a mixture of strips of black, red, and yellow cloth; a helmet ornamented with a white feather covers the head, and each bears an elegant battle-axe. They look like lay figures dressed as harlequins. After the conclusion of the function I went into the piazza or square of St. Peter. It was occupied by an immense mul- titude. Luxurious coaches traversed it in all directions, mil- itary bands performed warlike airs. The decoration of this piazza is admirable : in the centre the great obelisk, mute trophy of the victories of the Roman people in Egypt; at either side are fountains, which cast upward jets of sparkling water; to the right and left, intercolumniations open in colos- sal semicircles, half exposing the lovely southern vegetation of the adjoining gardens, and terminated by a magnificent diadem of statuary. On a height stands the Vatican, a palace which bears testimony to the genius of the first artists in the world ; and below, at the end of an elegant flight of steps, the Church of St. Peter, crowned by the dome of Michael An- 20 ARRIVAL IN ROME. gelo,who designed it grandly as an aerial temple ascending to- the infinite, among the rosy clouds of that glorious heaven which extends over all, as a magic gauze of incomparable beauty, its mantle of golden light. I must not forget to make an observation inspired by the festival. This city can not, notwithstanding so much splen- dor, perpetuate enchantment with the philtre of mysticism, nor ensnare in the nets of artifice. When Religion held in her hands arts, science, and politics, such a society was nat- urally governed by sacerdotal bodies. But from the time that all social employments became laic, a theocratic govern- ment became impossible. I noticed that the choirs of the Sistine Chapel have greatly degenerated. The sublime in- spirations of Palestrina can scarcely find worthy interpreters. This falling off is explained by the difficulty which exists in our time of finding such singers as are required by the Papal Court. It is known that women are not allowed to sing in the choir of St. Peter, and for trebles they have recourse to boys from infancy reduced to the condition of those unfortu- nates who guard Eastern harems. Alexander Dumas says, in one of his books of travels, that he saw over the shop of a Roman barber the following announcement : " Here boys are perfected." I never saw any thing of this kind ; but I know that the choirs decay, for there are now no families so despicable as thus to sacrifice their sons for money. And it is no longer possible that in order to support a religious and moral authority there should exist a city without a press, without a tribune, without the first rights constituting the personal protection of the people. ARRIVAL IN ROME. The internal tempest which rages in Rome is at once vis- ible to the stranger. There are three thousand emigrants in a city of two hundred thousand inhabitants. Four hundred persons are now in prison for political offenses ; and a priest of high position, an intimate friend of the Pope, and even an enthusiast for the temporal power, has assured me that Rome contains more than seventy thousand Garibaldians. Every thing indicates uneasiness. The city gates are defend- ed by barricades. At nine o'clock in the evening all shrink behind their walls — and that in an age when other towns open their gates to welcome light and air, new ideas and new sciences — the products of every clime and the representa- tives of every race and nation. At nightfall you meet guards at every corner, as in a be- sieged city. Passports are registered with astonishing mi- nuteness. A State which scarce contains six hundred thou- sand souls keeps up a standing army of twenty thousand ! These twenty thousand men are of different nations and speak different languages. The greater number do not un- derstand Italian. Thus the ties of blood and of language exist not among them, although they are bound together by the same religion and the same political sentiments. This is a serious inconvenience with regard to their manoeuvres. French, as the language most generally understood, is used in the army ; but it is unintelligible to the greater number of the private soldiers. In fact, to be able to live in Rome (not being born in the country) one must possess a mind of uncommon elevation — a soul capable of understanding her 22 ARRIVAL IN ROME. arts, her ruins, and her monuments. Those who are unable to hear the eloquent voices which awaken so many lofty ideas and inspirations, soon weary of this academical and monastic city. I do not speak idly ; but having closely ob- served the Pontifical forces, I declare that I found an ele- gance, a refinement, and a distinction of manners one would seek vainly in any other European army. It is well known that if a great part of it is mercenary, or has been entrapped into the service, most of it is composed of high-spirited and romantic youths — with a chivalrous worship for old institu- tions, exalted in their opinions and tastes, some of them hav- ing lost their illusions, but all more or less eccentric and sen- timental — seeking the exercise of arms and the turmoil of camps as food for that mysticism which formerly a more gentle and more religious generation sought in the silence of the cloister and the mortification of penance. These sol- diers have come from the four points of the horizon ; they belong to all Christian races, and speak all languages ; so Rome maintains under the Popes the character of universality bestowed on her by the Caesars. But this, which is a moral excellence, is a material disadvantage to the army. The no- tion of individuality, which the Germans have brought into modern history, is so deep-rooted that differences of race, of nationality, and of character continually show themselves in the ranks, and occasion innumerable conflicts. As the offi- cers speak one language and the subordinates another, friend- ly relations scarcely exist among them, though these are even more necessary than discipline in times of danger. As the ARRIVAL IN ROME. 2 ^ soldiers do not understand each other, there is no unity in their body ; and from this the greatest difficulties arise, and the chiefs are obliged to struggle through them in directing the manoeuvres. Catholic Rome chose Pagan Latin that all her children should have one spirit and one language. But the difference of pronunciation was so great that, though all spoke Latin, the monks of different nations did not under- stand each other, thus demonstrating the superiority of nature over law. Political Rome in our age has in her affliction selected the elegant and ductile language of Voltaire in ad- dressing her soldiers — that language fatal to all idols and idolatries. The aristocracy of the Roman army understand it, but not the rank and file. And the troops are discontent- ed, on account of the fatigue and difficulty of the manoeuvres and the continual mounting guard to which they are com- pelled by the growing anxieties of the Papal Court. Those nations which from their past history should send most soldiers, send fewest in proportion to their population. Spain destroyed herself to save Catholicism. Since the fif- teenth century the bones of her children have whitened every battle-field where she found it necessary to defend her relig- ion. She gave for it all the blood in her veins, and all the vitality of her spirit. But there are only thirty-eight Spanish soldiers in the Pontifical army. On the other hand, Holland, which protected the Reformation by its Princes of Orange, and introduced liberty of religious opinion into the modern world, has sent a great number of volunteers. This proves that while the freedom of worship has kept alive the Catholic 24 ARRIVAL IN ROME. faith in Protestant countries, intolerance has extinguished it in those places where it was most sincere and most exalted. But leaving these reflections and returning to political questions, I can not understand what the Pope proposes to do with this numerous army, so disproportioned to his means, to his resources, and to his State. The shadow of the French Empire protects him. The day in which that shadow is with- drawn, no matter how valiant the Papal army, it will not be able to resist a hundred thousand Italian soldiers. While the French protection endures, the Pontifical army is useless; and without French protection the Pontifical army would be insufficient. It serves only to consume the succor which is sent to the Pontiff with full and lavish hands from all Catholic nations. But all this comes now from an exaltation of senti- ment that can not continue. When Italy shall be convinced of her inability to struggle with Napoleon, or to promote the Franco-Prussian war with regard to the Roman question, the zeal of the faithful will diminish, the resources will fall away, and the army be speedily reduced. Then an insurrection will be not only possible, but easy ; for the people still preserve the love of liberty. It is wonderful what force and intelligence still remain in the physiognomy of these Romans, revealing all the indom- itable pride of that ancient character which conquered the known world. The women are tall and majestic, with well- turned shoulders. Their complexion is pale brown, the lips full, the nose aquiline; black and brilliant eyes, made more beautiful by long lashes and artistic brows, a statuesque fore- ARRIVAL IN ROME, 2 S head, and head like the Madonnas of the divine Raphael; dark and curling hair falls in large masses on sculptured necks — they have the manner of Roman matrons such as commanded Coriolanus to die for his country, or Caius Grac- chus to sacrifice himself for the people. The Roman youths inherit the beauty of their mothers, combined with manly vig- or. The silence imposed by the Inquisition and the obedi- ence exacted by despotism have not extinguished the spirit of this great people. The formula of ancient liberty yet trembles on their lips — Civis Romanus sum / Side by side we see the Oriental luxury of the cardinals and the rags of a starving populace ; here a gilded coach, and there a crowd of shoeless beggars ; close to magnificent palaces of marble there are heaps of refuse, emitting horrible effluvia. And yet this city is the capital of Italy. At the fall of evening, in the sacred hour of poetic silence, under the pure heavens, glorified by the last rays of the setting sun, which give an air of mysticism to all around ; from the height of the Pincio look on this city, with its eleven Egyptian obelisks, its three hundred cupolas, its groves of columns, its myriads of statues, and you see the seven hills from whence have sprung senators, consuls, and tribunes ; the political and civil rights of antiquity, now the bases of our rights ; contemplate the fagade of St. Peter's, the Great Basilica surmounted by the dome foretold by Bramante and executed by Michael Angelo; the Titanic mausoleum of Adrian, over which are extended the wings of the brazen seraphim ; there, to the left, the world of history, the walls on which are engraved a thousand victo- B 26 ARRIVAL IN ROME. ries, the Via Sacra where conquerors entered, the Forum, where the people gathered ; those arches which twenty centu- ries have passed without destroying ; those refreshing baths, copied so often by modern artists ; the Coliseum, that mount- ain sculptured by Titanic chisels ; the Quirinal, which contains the finest statues saved from the wreck of Greece ; the Capi- tol, head and cerebrum of the world. At the sight of so many marvels, at the recollection of so much grandeur, at the con- templation of such monuments, framed in groves of cypress, like a funereal wreath placed by an invisible deity ; at the soft music of bells which invite to vespers, like the voices of mar- tyrs ascending from the Catacombs ; the shadows of evening lingering sadly over the ruins, like the spirits of departed he- roes — the heart, swelled by emotions, confesses that Rome is not only the capital of Italy, but the eternal centre of the world ! One must be Italian, must feel Southern blood in his veins, must have been educated in this glorious history under the painted wings of classic poetry, to comprehend all the influ- ence which Rome exercises over the Italians. Those who desired to make Italy a monarchy, and afterward denied her the capital which is hers by nature, did but construct a head- less body. It is easy to see that if Italy was a republican fed- eration, the question of capital would be secondary. One can also understand that being a State adjoining other republican States, however analogous were the laws to those of Italy, it would preserve Rome, from respect to the Popes, to the nuns and the monastic character of the city; in the same way that ARRIVAL IN ROME. 2 y Freiburg has been kept, although it is between two Protestant and Liberal cantons like those of Vaud and Berne. But Italy having been constituted a monarchy from the natural aversion all European potentates have for republics, Rome is of Italy and Italy is of Rome, bound as the satellites to their planets and the planets to the sun. And in this city, now composed of churches and convents, where no trace of civil or political life is perceptible, where for all laic authority we see a few senators in painted coaches, followed by gaudily dressed lackeys (absurd parody on the ancient senators), this theo- cratic and monastic Rome, always kneeling on her marble ruins, must erect the tribune and the Forum, must allow lib- erty to the press, must call forth the ancient eloquence, en- courage the discussion of all problems and the establishment of different schools ; for the political spirit can not be driven from the sacred regions from whence it sprung. In the mean time Rome is a city of the dead. I followed with a sort of archaeological curiosity the ceremonies of the Holy Week. Some were Oriental from their ostentation, some Byzantine from their refinement, others trifling to puer- ility : all absolutely removed from this age, and from a relig- ious stand-point inferior to the solemn majesty of Spanish worship. A Spaniard or an American accustomed to the severity of our towns in the Holy Week, to that severity for bidding shops to be open and carriages to appear in the streets, could hardly understand that on Thursday and Good Friday they work in this city as on other days ; that all estab- lishments are open, and more people throng the sausage-shops 28 ARRIVAL IN ROME. to admire hams decorated with laurels and flowers than the churches to visit the Sagrarios. He -could not comprehend that the twelve paupers served by the Pope in memory of the Last Supper of the Saviour laugh as if they were in a thea- tre, and snatch at the sweets and comfits as if they were at a merry-making or picnic. He would not believe that at five o'clock on Thursday evening a Penitentiary Cardinal enters the Great Basilica, and, sitting at the left of the tomb of St. Peter, pardons sins by waving about a wand, and touching with it the heads of the penitents, as if he were fishing in the air. I have seen very pious ladies laugh at all these absurd- ities. But there is one grand and sublime ceremony, the Mise- rere of St. Peter. The music is exquisite, the effect surpris- ing. Rome saw, in the sixteenth century, that Protestantism surpassed her in music, as she excelled Protestantism in the arts of painting, sculpture, and architecture. To prevent this inferiority, she naturally sought a master of song, and found the sublime Palestrina, the Michael Angelo of the lyre. The Pope forbade the reproduction of his Miserere, in order that it should be heard only in that church whose gigantic arches were completely in harmony with its sublimity. One day a noble youth heard entranced the Miserere. This youth, who may be called the Raphael of music, learned it by heart, and divulged it to the world. He was Mozart. The German genius came to steal the secrets of the Latin genius in the eternal war between both races. No pen can describe the solemnity of the Miserere ! The night advances. The ARRIVAL IN ROME. 2 g Basilica is in darkness. Her altars are uncovered. Through the open arches there penetrates the uncertain light of dawn, which seems to deepen the shadows. The last taper of the tenebrario is hidden behind the altar. The cathedral resem- bles an immense mausoleum, with the faint gleaming of fu- nereal torches in the distance. The music of the Miserere is not instrumental. It is a sublime choir admirably combined. Now it comes like the far-off roar of the tempest, as the vi- bration of the wind upon the ruins or among the cypresses of tombs j again like a lamentation from the depths of the earth, or a moaning of heaven's angels breaking into sobs and sorrowful weeping. The marble statues, gigantic and of dazzling whiteness, are not completely hidden by the dark- ness, but appear like the spirits of past ages coming out of the sepulchres and loosing their shrouds, to join the intona- tion of this canticle of despair. The whole church is agita- ted and vibrates as if words of horror were arising from the stones. This profound and sublime lament, this mourning of bitterness dying away into airy circles, penetrates the heart by the intensity of its sadness ; it is the voice of Rome sup- plicating Heaven from her load of ashes, as if under her sackcloth she writhed in her death agony. To weep thus, to lament as the prophets of old by the banks of Euphrates, or among the scattered stones of the temple, to sigh in this sublime cadence, becomes a City whose eternal sorrow has not marred her eternal beauty. Thus she is enslaved. Da- vid alone can be her poet. Her canticle is majestic and unequaled. Rome, Rome ! thou art grand, thou art immortpl 30 ARRIVAL IN ROME. even. in thy desperation and thy abandonment! The human heart shall be thy eternal altar, although the faith which has been thy prestige should perish, as the conquests that made thy greatness have departed ! None can rob thee of thy God-given immortality, which thy Pontiffs have sustained and which thy artists will forever preserve ! Chapter II. THE GREAT RUIN. To see the Eternal City was long the dream of my exist- ence, one of the most anxious desires of my heart. As a boy the Roman religion spoke to me of God, of immortality, of redemption ; of all that enlarges the horizon of the soul even to the infinite. In youth the Latin language was my chief study — a study that to a plastic imagination showed in high relief the sweet verses of Virgil, the conciseness of Tacitus, and the grander periods of Titus Livius ; those heroes of an- tiquity who lived for liberty and for their country. On entering the portals of the University education, Ro- man literature and Roman law inspire the mind with an ear- nest desire to see those hills from whence so much light has shone upon human consciences ; those sepulchres which inclose illustrious remains, which have nourished the plant of civilization upon our earth ; the stones embrowned by sun and time, where consul and tribune have carved their names, apostles and martyrs their crosses— true mementoes, not of time, but rather of the universal effort to obtain and realize an ideal, that absorbs and torments man, but which also elevates and transfigures him ; compelling him to be, as 3 2 THE GREAT RUIN. a warrior engaged in an incessant struggle, an agent and minister of endless progress. Tired of politics in Madrid, of commerce in London, of gayety in Paris, and even of Nature in Geneva; wearied also with the positive tendencies of our age, visible at every step and at every moment, I took refuge in Rome, in order to spend some happy hours with history, art, and religion. But I was unable to disengage myself from a republican friend who, sure of the agreement of our sentiments and of my aver- sion for the holy office, unburdened his sinful conscience, and broke his enforced silence of twenty years passed under the Pontifical rod, by describing the abuses of Roman absolut- ism, of which I had heard much, and which I heartily detest- ed ; but the relation of which at that time did not harmonize with my desire to wander among the ruins, remote from all political labor, and to give free course to my dreams and re- flections. " To what a place you come in search of knowledge I" said he, cold by temperament, before the marvels I viewed with transport. "Here every body is interested about lottery tickets ; no one for an idea of the human brain. The com- memoration of the anniversary of Shakespeare has been pro- hibited in this city of the arts. Her censorship is so wise that when a certain writer wished to publish a book on the discoveries of Volta she let loose on him the thunders of the Index, thinking it treated of Voltairianism — a philosophy which leaves neither repose nor digestion to our cardinals. On the other hand, a cabalistic and astrological book, pro- THE GREAT RUIN. „ fessing to divine the caprices of the lottery, has been printed and published under the Pontifical seal, as containing noth- ing contrary to religion, morals, or sovereign authority." " I know all this," I said. " I have read it a hundred times in Dumesnil, KaufTmann, Othendal, and Edmond About." " Then, knowing this, do you seek here new ideas ? Rabe- lais knew this city — Rabelais. On arriving, in place of writ- ing a dissertation on dogmas, he penned one on lettuces, the only good and fresh articles in this cursed dungeon. And priest though he was, a priest of the sixteenth century, more religious than our generation, he had a long correspondence with the pious Bishop of Maillerais on the children of the Pope ; for the reverend prelate had especially charged him to ascertain whether the Cavaliere Pietro Luis Farnese was the lawful or illegitimate son of his Holiness. Believe me, Rabe- lais knew Rome." Talking thus we turned into a cross street and soon found ourselves in a small square. A balcony of the principal house in this place was adorned with rich hangings of crimson dam- ask. Fixed upon the balcony there shone a crystal globe with gilded ornaments, at one side of which was a golden han- dle. Before the house an immense multitude, ragged and poverty-stricken, were pressed together. There was a singular expression in all the eyes turned upon the balcony ; in the hands were papers, images of saints, and scapularies ; a sepul- chral silence prevailed — a silence incomprehensible among the loquacious people of the South, and a solemnity suitable for a religious ceremony. My suspicions were confirmed when B 2 34 THE GREAT RUIN. an acolyte came out on the balcony, and behind him some ec- clesiastics of rubicund visage and obese proportions. After the ecclesiastics there followed a Prince of the Holy Roman Church, attired in rustling violet silk and a tunic of white lace. He wore a small calotte or cap, also violet, with a rich tassel, the color of the pomegranate blossom. The silence was bro- ken by the joyful shouts of the multitude. Some of the peas- ants, who still preserve the antique statuesque beauty in the open forehead, the aquiline nose, and full lips, fell on their knees and folded their hands ecstatically, offering up prayers that sounded like conjurations. Others drew forth pictures of their holy protectors, mostly grimy, and kissed them in trans- port. Others jumped in the air, extending their arms, and pro- nouncing incoherent phrases. It was Saturday, the day for sorcery. Twelve o'clock approached, the bells began to sound the hour, and the crowd became still more anxiously excited. The cardinal lifted the golden handle and gave several turns to the globe of crystal. The acolyte put in his hand and drew forth a number. It was the official and Pontifical lottery! The Garibaldian was right. Is this a place for the intellect ? Let us plunge into antiquity as a diver in the sea. Our life is so short, our being so little, that to arrive at an idea of the infinite, to which we are attached by invisible ties — to compre- hend the immortality of which we dream — we must set behind the limited visible horizon and the unlimited rational horizon, behind every thought of life, interminable perspectives, dis- tant and immense, presentments which overcome us with beau- ty, glowing colors on magic palettes, the inspirations of celes- THE GREAT RUIN. 35 tial poetry, the ideas we have evoked from the dust of ages and the abyss of history ! Is it true that we have before us a trembling light, pale and almost imperceptible ? It is like that of the glow-worm — like that which we call an idea ? Is it true that with this light we can kindle the material world, dissipate it, and offer it to the spirit as the smoke of a sacrifice ? Doubtless. Nature ap- pears to our eyes a thousand times, like a multiform image of conscience. The light is no more than the golden veil behind which is concealed the Infinite Mind, which grouped in scales of musical harmony suns and their satellites. The universe, that universe which overcomes us by its vastness, is the poem of our sentiments, the mysterious apocalypse writ- ten with words of stars, with lines of constellations in this im- measurable ether, of whose real existence we are certain, in that immensity without borders or foundations which we call space ! As at the feet of men the Pagan gods have fallen, like to the imperishable gods created and destroyed by the imagination, whose bones lie in heaps in the great necropolis of the Roman Campagna, so may worlds be ruined and retain among their cold ashes the warmth and vitality of our spirits ! While protesting with vain reflections against human little- ness, I arrived alone face to face with the Roman Coliseum. The first impression it produced was one of astonishment. If I had not been born on the sea-shore, and accustomed from childhood to its expanse, I should have been overcome by emotion. Seeing the Coliseum for the first time in manhood, my changing and lively fancy carried me back to my Profes- 36 THE GREAT RUIN. sorial chair, where we read the epigrams of Martial, and there rose to my lips the verses which we meet with in the learned guide-book published by Roman archaeologists : " Barbara Piramidum sileant miracula Memphis Omnis Ccesareo cedat labor Amphitheatro" These were the gardens of Nero ! Here he walked, clothed in purple, shod with azure buskins ; his temples crowned with laurels ; his eyes fixed on the heavens ; in his hands a cithern ; on his tongue ancient Greek verses, and in his heart evil passions — like a demon who tries to be a god, and, pos- sessing for a moment the divinity of art, turns and falls into the abyss. He was consul, tribune, dictator, Caesar, sovereign pontiff— all blessed him — all adored him ; but, alas ! he was despised by his own conscience. Posterity has not been so lenient toward him as toward the other emperors, for Nero was always a tyrant without remorse. There have been so many with dead consciences ! There have been so many that murder, burn, destroy whole cities, and believe these actions are meritorious in God's eyes ! To-day there is a Caesar of the North of Europe, who, in order to grasp the sceptre of Germany, has laid hold of unhappy France, and at the echo of his cannon — amid fire, ruin, deso- lation, and the groans of the dying — has invoked the name of God as the accomplice of his crimes ! Nero murdered his mother; but he felt on the sea-shore the grief of Orestes, and heard the murmurs of the Eumenides. Nero oppressed hu- manity; but in his last hour he proclaimed aloud that he ought THE GREAT RUIN. ^ to have been an artist, but not Caesar. The Pagan religion did more to preserve the conscience and its jurisdiction over life than pretended Christianity. I have been false to Nero, since his name is united to that of the Coliseum. In this place was the reservoir of the Ro- man gardens, and before that a colossal statue of the divine emperor with the attributes of Apollo, the god of light and harmony, holding the lyre to whose melody the Muses danced, and on his temples laid the green laurel of Daphne. The family of Vespasian, in hatred of the son of Agrippina, had destroyed his golden house full of immortal works, tearing down the Colossus and building the Amphitheatre in its place ; but they could destroy neither the name nor the rec- ord of the Apollo statue of Nero ; and this name, degener- ated and corrupt — Coliseum — leaves to-day this colossal mon- ument ! Indeed, it looks less the work of men than of nature. These gigantic proportions, these immense masses, seem not to have been created by human strength, but by the power of the Great Architect, of the Great Artist who has raised the eter- nal pyramids of the Alps, and has built up the wondrous cone of Vesuvius by the creating fire whose reverberations resound with the manufacture of crystals and granite. It is only when we observe the harmony of its arches, the sequence of its col- umns, the rhythm of that architecture which ascends to heaven as a canticle, that we find those enormous blocks have been distributed by human thought, and that the Amphitheatre has been sealed with the stamp of its laws. 38 THE GREAT RUIN. Now the Coliseum is for the most part in ruins. When it was all perfect, two flights of steps supported it as huge ped- estals. Four stories are placed above. Eighty open arches, forming eighty entrances, surround the first story. At the sides of the arches are raised half-columns attached to the wall, and belonging to the severe Doric order. Upon this first story there extends a cornice, and over the cornice other eighty arches, by the sides of which are placed half-columns of the lighter and more graceful Ionic architecture. Another cornice, the same as the preceding, completes the second story, and serves as a base for the third, also cut in arches, and ornamented with columns, but of the rich and florid Co- rinthian order. The monument is completed by an airy por- tico, resembling a chiseled crown-light, ornamented by pilas- ters, and having openings through which the heavenly azure of the sky seems to look more brilliant. This vast building is fifty-two metres high. To define it in a few words, I would call it a circular mountain, raised, sculptured, and chiseled by the labor of man. The side toward the north-east is in the best preservation. On its walls the succession of arches can be best studied, the harmonious staircase formed by the col- umns, the order and the grace of its cornices, the severe maj- esty of the first story, and the lightness of the upper part, which crowns all, and gives to such an enormous mass the fin- ish and beauty of a jewel. In these monuments we see the conceptions and character of Roman architecture \ Grecian grace and beauty is replaced by colossal grandeur. The Coliseum is a monument worthy THE GREAT RUIN, 39 of a sovereign people, of a conquering people, of a Titanic people : — of a people which counted legions of slaves and armies of workmen, on whose shoulders alone were borne to giddy heights these immense blocks of stone. Those who construct- ed the Coliseum had seen the East and its huge buildings, on which they desired to lay the Orders of Grecian architecture as a garland. Roman architecture has not the beauty of the Corinthian, which took for its model the lovely form of a Gre- cian woman — of that goddess the mother of all the arts. The Roman buildings are less beautiful but more majestic than the Greek, and there floats over them the invisible conception of a universal, assimilating spirit, which has united Grecian har- mony and Asiatic magnitude, abounding on the earth and in history, without touching an ideal that soars to be lost among the heavens in rosy clouds and mysteries, half light, half shad- ow. Later Roman monuments, constructed on as vast a scale, we shall see tending to useful ends — practical, immediate, like all improvements. The god Eros, the Greek god of love, has been replaced in Rome by the god of all uncleanness — the god of that substance which covers and fertilizes the fields, as Hellenic metaphysics have been replaced by right and moral- ity, with principles and. sciences relating more immediately to life and society. The Coliseum has all the characteristics of Roman archi- tecture. It can be better learned in this great example, left miraculously by past ages, than in the pages of Vitruvius, probably altered and interpolated by the learned of the Re- naissance period. Look at this mortar, that seems hardened 4 THE GREAT RUIN. as granite is hardened by the irregular internal movements of the planet ! Look at the cellars and vaults — contrivances un- known among the Greeks — admirably constructed in this land of strength and empire ! Behold the arches which the Hel- lenic world never erected, and that look like the triumphal gates by which history entered with a new life and a new spirit ! See how the Roman has placed a plinth to support the Doric pillar which the Greek rooted in the bosom of the earth as the trunk of a tree ! Contemplate those three Or- ders, always separated in Greek architecture, and united here in an ascending scale : first, the most simple and severe, the Doric, at the base ; then the lightest and most elegant, the Ionic, in the centre ; and lastly, the most florid and ornate, the Corinthian, crowning the whole as the diadem and capital of the monument ! The spirit of a constructive people is vis- ible in the whole building. The Roman has united the three Orders in his erections, as he has united the Greek gods in the Pantheon, and his style is the great epilogue of antique genius. Rome took from Greece her metaphysics and her re- ligion, from the Sabines their women, from Spain her swords, from the East her arches, and from Etruria her bows. Thus it may be said that Greece is the flower, and Rome the fruit, of ancient history. Monuments like the Coliseum are, in fact, but the mighty bones of the immense organism which com- poses the Eternal City. And to think that this edifice, which has conquered twenty ages, with all their destruction, was built in less than three years ! It was erected, as we have heard, by some emperors THE GREAT RUIN. 4I of the Flavian family, under whose domination Tacitus cursed despotism and mourned the republic. Titus, whom universal adulation named the delight of the human race, burned Jeru- salem ; on her calcined stones he immolated a million and a half of Jews, and destined the rest to die in the gladiatorial shows of Syrian cities, to be trophies of the triumphal entry of the conqueror by the Via Sacra, to raise on shoulders livid from the lash the masses of this amphitheatre, and to be de- voured by hungry beasts in the circus ! Titus — after having loved Berenice as Antony loved Cleo- patra, after having heard his own victims call him Messiah, after having been called a god by those Egyptians whose fields gods visited, after having consecrated under the shadow of the pyramids nine bullocks to the god Apis, after having organ- ized an escort of Oriental Satraps, and enjoyed through an entire day the cruel honors of triumph beneath the arches of the Eternal City — demolished the golden house of Nero, ex- changed the statue of the sun for that of Caesar adored by the populace ; he dried up the lake which extended between the Mount Caelium and the Esquiline Mount, tore down the groves, cut up the pasturage on classic shores, and raised the greatest amphitheatre the world has yet beheld, solemnizing its inauguration by a hundred days of feasting, in which there were combats of stags, elephants, tigers, lions, and of men — terrible struggles, which sprinkled with hot blood the face of Caesar and those of his people. Nine thousand animals per- ished during those sanguinary orgies upon the arena. His- tory, which has preserved their number, does not mention that 42 THE GREAT RUIN. of the human sacrifices ; doubtless because slaves were more worthless than wild beasts to the Caesars. Titus sought something to assuage his insatiable thirst of ambition, and sought it vainly. After having the world under his hand, there was no more for him to obtain ; he had upon his shoulders the mantle of the Caesars; all submitted like sheep to his authority; the world was subdued and silent. But, unable to attain his wishes and satisfy his ambition, the heart of Titus was broken. He had nothing to desire, or had but desires that were vague and infinite, which dissipated themselves in fantastic dreams, exhausting with them his ex- istence. Certain it is that, despising the throne, a profound sadness took possession of him : his frame was attenuated by a kind of internal consumption ; his respiration was heavy with sighs and his heart with sorrow; his eyes were filled with tears and his life with illusions ; his sleep became oppressive ; his past was remorseful, his future terrifying ; till one day, wan- dering in the poisonous Roman Campagna in search of a spot where to sleep away his disgust, he expired, looking up to heaven with eyes inflamed by the fever of infinite and unsatis- fied desires. While I thought of the life and death of Titus, I wondered at the boundless ambition of a Caesar to rule the heavens as he possessed the earth, without any other advan- tage than to keep beneath his foot the seething mass of his crimes, and to heap upon his head the maledictions of hu- manity. Indulging these thoughts and recollections, I went over the whole monument. I observed and studied it as the naturalist THE GREAT RUIN. 43 might study a mountain. I went through all the passages, so spacious that a hundred thousand spectators could enter and depart with rapidity, and without incommoding each other. I mounted to the highest steps, from whence can be seen the Roman Campagna: before me were the distant lagunes; to the right the Arches of Titus and of Constantine, the Pyramid of Caius Cestus, and the Basilica of St. Paul ; on the left the Catacombs of St. Sebastian, the Via Appia with its double row of tombs; behind, the Palatine, the Forum, the Via Sacra, the Arch of Septimus Severus, the Capitol. In whatever place, ideas are preserved like a rich treasure ; those scenes are sug- gestive of recollections ; they are the true West of the ancient regime, the true East of modern progress. I was so much absorbed that evening came upon me im- perceptibly. The city bells announced the hour for vespers ; the owls and other birds of the night began their first cries ; I heard the hoarse and monotonous croak of the toad and frog in the distant lagunes, and the chant of a procession en- tering the neighboring church ; spiritual voices mingled with those of nature, which made my meditations still more pro- found and silent, as if the soul escaped from the body to attach itself, after the manner of parasitic plants, to the dust of imperishable ruins. The full moon rose in the serene and tranquil horizon, and lent with her melancholy rays fresh poetic touches to the arches, to the columns, to the vaults, to the scattered stones, to the desolation of the place ; to the cross reared in its centre, as an eternal vengeance taken by the gladiators, oblig- 44 THE GREAT RUIN. ing the most abject of the Roman people to bless and adore the once infamous gibbet of slaves, now transformed into the standard of modern civilization ! At the splendor of the rising moon, at the echo of the bells which sounded among the uncertain shadows, I seemed to see, awaking from their dust, the souls of departed genera- tions, coming with silent flight to revisit those spots conse- crated by their souvenirs and beloved even in the tomb. I wished to stay the spirits, and tell them, alas ! all that passes in our world. I would have said : " If you be souls of trib- unes, of senators, of Caesars, know all that you loved has perished, and that already ages have worn even the steps of your altars by their kisses ; all those gods you believe im- mortal have passed away, and the ideas by which they were animated, whirled like withered leaves in the abyss of his- tory, have been loosened from the human spirit by continual renovation of ideas. No more do the Nereids move grace- fully in the foam of the sea ; no more do nymphs of marble whiteness sigh in the murmuring rivulet! The god Pan has dropped his pipe, once filled with the melody of the groves. To the intoxication of the Bacchantes have succeeded macer- ation, penance, and an indifference to the charms of nature. A Nazarene, a son of Israel, of the slaves, of that race which raised with a chain on their foot and a lash on their shoul- der the mighty Coliseum, has conquered and buried the gods who inspired Horace and Virgil, who sustained Scipio in the plains of Carthage and Marius in the putrid fields — the gods who brought forth art and directed victory! In THE GREAT RUIN. 4S vain did Tacitus look contemptuously on the followers of this obscure youth, a poor carpenter of Judea ! in vain Apuleius ridiculed them in his apologies and fables ! Not even the immortal scorn of Lucian could dissipate the breath that ex- haled from those lips, the truth and justice which poured from that infinite mind ! The gods died, and upon their corpses dead Rome has fallen ! The Forum is now a field where cows graze peacefully. The Coliseum is a pile of ruins, where Romans preserve and worship the gibbet of an- cient slavery. The Via Sacra is no more. Upon the Capi- tol are performed the religious ceremonies of the Nazarene. Those you thought disturbers of the public peace have the altars and monuments once sacred to the gods of Cato and Camillus. Barbarous hordes from the North stifled the ora- cles, interrupted the sacred rites, delivering (as if it were a spoil) the human conscience to crowds of cenobites, who is- sued from the sewers and Catacombs. And when the new creed had taken possession of souls, when it had substituted its altars for those of Pagans — as if the human mind was con- demned to weave and unweave continually the same web of ideas — new champions, new tribunes, new apostles, new mar- tyrs arose to overthrow the faith of their ancestors. And the human conscience passed through new phases, and the human heart experienced new tortures, and new extremes of sorrow troubled the bleeding earth. As my lips murmur these vague and incoherent imaginings, my ears seem to hear sounds of wailing. Is it the moaning of the wind among pines and cypresses ? Is it the last sigh 4 6 THE GREAT RUIN. of the meadows sinking in the arms of night, or the echo of a great city, of its orisons and lamentations, like the expres- sion of overwhelming and deep emotion ? "Sunt lacryma rerum /" In imagination I beheld a festival in the amphitheatre. This enormous pile was not now a skeleton. Here stood a statue, there a trophy; opposite, a monolith brought from Asia or Egypt. The people entered, after having washed and perfumed themselves in the public baths, mounting to the top to disperse over the places previously assigned to them. At one side was the gate of life, through which passed the com- batants \ at the other the gate of death, through which were dragged the corpses. The shouts of the multitude, the sharp sound of the trumpets, mingle with the howling and roaring of wild animals. While the senators and the emperor arrive, attendants of inferior municipal rank scatter parched peas among the people, which they carry in wicker baskets like those of our traders at fairs. The ground is brilliant with gold powder, with carmine and minium to hide the blood, while the light is tempered by great awnings of Oriental pur- ple, which tinges the spectators with its glowing reflection. The senators occupy the lowest steps. Behind them are placed the cavaliers. Above are those fathers of families who have given a certain number of children to the empire. Beyond these are the people. And on the top, crowning the whole, are the Roman matrons, clothed in light gauzes and loaded with costly jewels, perfuming the air with aromatics THE GREAT RUIN. 4 y carried in golden apples, and kindling all hearts by their soft words and tender glances. While the spectators look to the emperor to give the signal for the commencement of the festival, conversation is car- ried on in a loud murmur. Look at that glutton — he is so rich that he knows not half of his possessions ! Lolia Pau- lina is wearing emeralds worth sixty million sexterces — a small sum compared with the enormous robberies of her grandfather in the oppressed provinces. He who accompa- nies Caesar stole at a supper of Claudius a golden cup. These reckless madcaps salute the orator Regulus, for they fear the venom distilled from his viperous tongue. He is honored, while generals who have conquered barbarian hordes, and died in defense of Rome, have been ten years unburied. The doctor Eudemus arrives, and his pupils in corruption and de- bauchery are not behind. That child of eight years is al- ready depraved. That lady, who belongs to one of the most noble Roman families, has quitted the list of matrons and be- come degraded. Caesar is received by the people with loud acclamations ; he is always welcome at festivals and especially at massacres. The priests and vestals offer sacrifices to the protecting gods of Rome. Blood flows \ the entrails of the victims are quick- ly consumed in the sacred fire ; the music sounds, the mul- titude vociferates, and at an Imperial signal come forth the gladiators, who salute the crowd with a smile on their lips, as if a delicious feast awaited them instead of a cruel and re- lentless death. 48 THE GREAT RUIN. These unfortunates are divided in several categories. Some guide cars, painted green ; others shelter themselves behind round bucklers of iron, on the outside of which sharp knives are fixed. They throw their tridents in the air, and catch them again with much dexterity. Their costume is a red tunic, azure buskins, a gilded helmet surmounted by a shining fish. The equestrians conduct their horses with great agility in the circus. The light is reflected on the steel breastplates, collars, and bracelets. Their robes are many- colored, and bring to mind Oriental dresses. Last come the duelists — a body all handsome, all unclothed, all imitating in their artistic attitudes the positions of classic sculptures. They are saluted frantically by the people, for they are the strongest, the most exposed, and the most valiant. They were born in the mountains, in the desert, among the caresses of nature, breathing the pure air of the fields and of sacred liberty. War and war only has torn them from their country. Rome has fed them for the sake of their blood — blood to be offered in sacrifice to the majesty of the Roman people. Some of them now about to wound and murder each other have contracted close friendships. Perhaps some are brothers by nature, brothers by sentiment, obliged thus to en- danger and immolate themselves, when, united by the same sentiments, they wish to bury their swords in the heart of Caesar, and to avenge their race and country. Already they lie in ambush, they search, they threaten, they entice and persist in this boisterous and bloody strife. If any one, moved by terror for himself or compassion for his THE GREAT RUIN. 49 opponent, draws back or seems to shrink, the master of the circus tortures him with a red-hot iron button applied on his naked shoulder. The crimson blood flows and smokes in the circus. One man has slipped and fallen. The people shout, believing him dead, and hiss when he rises. He loses heart after vain and desperate efforts to keep on foot. This one falls, pierced by a single wound given through his buck- ler. That one writhes in insupportable anguish, which looks like an epileptic spasm. Two are mortally wounded, but in falling fling away their swords, and embrace each other as a support and help in the death agony. Mutilated limbs, torn intestines, groans of anguish, the death-rattle of the expiring, faces contracted and fixed, last sighs mingled with lamenta- tions, cries of rage and desperation ; — all this is a grand spec- tacle for the Roman people, who shout, clap their hands, be- come intoxicated, infuriated ; following the combat with nerv- ous anxiety, straining their eyes from the sockets to see more of the slaughter, opening their lungs and nostrils to inhale the bloody vapors. Anger seems to float as the master passion over all this feast of blood. Antique sculpture, generally of an Olympian severity, has left us the lively image of this anger in the statue of the dying gladiator. Over his dilated eyes hang his dark and knitted eyebrows. His robust frame is subject to a wonderful tension. His head is advanced, and makes an in- clination over his breast in order to aim his thrust aright. His body is in the act of rushing forward to the combat, sup- ported only on the right foot. His left arm threatens, at the C 5° THE GREAT RUIN. moment that his right wrist, strongly contracted, prepares to give a mortal blow. The statue is the image of hatred. And hatred has engendered in Rome a thick cloud of anger, of curses that found a terrible satisfaction in the Apocalyptic night of eternal vengeance, in the night of the victories of Alaric, of the orgies of barbarians, the sons of slaves and glad- iators ! Who, who can turn aside Rome's punishment? All her power, all her majesty, all her greatness have been destroyed for an idea. There in the Catacombs hide obscure sectari- ans who oppose spiritual light to ancient sensuality — to the Pagan and Imperial religion, dogmas which Rome can not ad- mit without perishing. These sectarians fly the light of day, and bury themselves fearfully in the Catacombs. There they paint the Good Shepherd who guides them to eternity, the Dove which announced the termination of the great deluge of tears in which our life is overwhelmed. There they intone hymns to an obscure tribune, poor and feeble ; who did not die as a conqueror, but humbly and ignominiously on a cross. From thence have come forth those confessors of the new faith, to seal it with their blood on the arena of the circus. The old man, the youth, the tender maiden, have heard with- out trembling the cries of the Asiatic tiger, the roar of the lion of Africa. Hungry beasts of prey have come from the dens still visible in the foundations of the circus, and fixed their teeth and claws in the defenseless bodies of the martyrs. While panthers, hyenas, tigers, and lions divide the palpitating remains ; while they drink the blood of these Christians with THE GREA T R UIN. 5 x insatiable fury, the Romans give thanks to Caesar, believing that a superstition has been destroyed with the lives of the unbelievers, and that with the blood the beasts have devoured a heresy ! And now emperors have died, and praetors are dispersed, and the stones of the Coliseum have fallen, and a new idea has replaced the ancient belief, and converted them from be- ing persecuted to persecutors ; has attempted in its turn to destroy new sects, to stifle new opinions — not being able to arrive — neither with its excommunications, nor its inquisition, nor its tortures — at the immortal idea of the human spirit, that shines eternally among gods and ruins, among those who die and those who suffer, among creeds and dogmas, perpetual as the sun in the choirs of the universe. Chapter III. THE ROMAN CATACOMBS. If the Roman city above ground is curious and wonderful, that which is hidden beneath is still more astonishing. Above, the wind shakes the ivy and the vine upon the walls, and all around reveals the faith of other ages. Below, in the solem- nity of darkness, where the coldness and humidity of night are eternal ; in those caves and grottoes formed in the depths of the earth, those silent vaults, whose obscurity is sometimes lighted by false fires, the product of decaying bones heaped there for ages, there is now no living soul. But in other times — times sacred and solemn — those Catacombs contained the germ of that faith which gave vitality to the human conscience and enlightenment to the world. I turned with religious reverence toward those places hal- lowed by the veneration of so many ages, my mind overcome with tenderness and emotion ; indeed, the Roman Campagna invites to meditation on the instability of human greatness and the worthlessness of the greatest earthly majesty. There remains only a recollection of that population which once filled the world. Of those institutions which supported the weight of so many ages, we see but the traces. Broken walls, a few arches, some columns, half-legible inscriptions, THE ROMAN CATACOMBS. c